Tarḫunna or Tarḫuna/i was the Hittite

weather god A weather god or goddess, also frequently known as a storm god or goddess, is a deity in mythology associated with weather phenomena such as thunder, snow, lightning, rain, wind, storms, tornadoes, and hurricanes. Should they only be in charge of ...

. He was also referred to as the "Weather god of Heaven" or the "Lord of the Land of Hatti".

Name

Tarḫunna is a

cognate In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words in different languages that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymological ancestor in a common parent language. Because language change can have radical ...

of the Hittite verb ''tarḫu-^zi'', "to prevail, conquer, be powerful, be able, defeat"; from the Proto-Anatolian weather god ''*Tṛḫu-ent-,'' "conquering"; ultimately from

PIE A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients. Sweet pies may be filled with fruit (as in an apple pie), nuts (pecan pie), brown sugar ( sugar pie), sweete ...

''*terh₂-'', "to cross over, pass through, overcome". The same name was used in almost all

Anatolian languages The Anatolian languages are an extinct branch of Indo-European languages that were spoken in Anatolia, part of present-day Turkey. The best known Anatolian language is Hittite, which is considered the earliest-attested Indo-European language. ...

: Luwian '' Tarḫunz-''; Carian ''Trquδ-''; Milyan ''Trqqñt-'', and Lycian: ''Trqqas'' (A), ''Trqqiz'' (B). Norbert Oettinger has argued that the functions of the Anatolian weather god ultimately come from the

Proto-Indo-European Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo-E ...

god Perk^wunos, but that they did not preserve the old name to coin instead the new epithet ''Tṛḫu-ent-'' ("conquering"), which sounded close to the name of the Hattian Storm-god ''Taru''.

Role

As weather god, Tarḫunna was responsible for the various manifestations of the weather, especially thunder, lightning, rain, clouds, and storms. He ruled over the heavens and the mountains. Thus it was Tarḫunna who decided whether there would be fertile fields and good harvests, or drought and famine and he was treated by the Hittites as the ruler of the gods. Tarḫunna legitimised the position of the Hittite king, who ruled the land of Hatti in the name of the gods. He watched over the kingdom and the other institutions of the state, but also borders and roads.

Genealogy

Tarḫunna is the partner of the

Sun goddess of Arinna The Sun goddess of Arinna, also sometimes identified as Arinniti or as Wuru(n)šemu, is the chief goddess and companion of the weather god Tarḫunna in Hittite mythology. She protected the Hittite kingdom and was called the "Queen of all lands." ...

. Their children are the gods

Telipinu Telipinu was the last king of the Hittites Old Kingdom, living in 16th century BC, reigned c. 1525-1500 BC in middle chronology. At the beginning of his reign, the Hittite Empire had contracted to its core territories, having long since lost all ...

and , the goddesses Mezulla and Inara, the Weather god of Zippalanda and the

Weather god of Nerik The Weather god of Nerik is a Hittite weather god, who was mainly worshipped in the Hittite city of Nerik, whose cult was relocated to Kaštama and Takupša for two hundred years after the Hittites lost Nerik to the Kaskians. He was also referred t ...

. As a result of his identification with the Hurrian god Teššup, Tarḫunna is also the partner of

Ḫepat Ḫebat ( xhu, 𒀭𒄭𒁁, ), also transcribed Khepat, was the mother goddess of the Hurrians, known as "the mother of all living". She was a popular deity, and her name appears in many Theophoric name, theophoric personal names. A king of Je ...

(who is syncretised with the Sun goddess of Arinna) and the father of the god Šarruma and the goddesses

Allanzu Allanzu, later known under the name Alasuwa, was a Hurrian goddess regarded as a daughter of Ḫepat. She was described as a youthful deity and in known texts often appears in association with her mother and siblings. She was also worshiped by H ...

and Kunzišalli. His siblings are Šuwaliyat (identified with the Hurrian

Tašmišu Tašmišu (Tashmishu) was a Hurrian god. He was regarded as a brother of Teshub, and it is assumed he had a warlike character. Character Volkert Haas proposed that Tašmišu's name was derived from the Hurrian word ''tašmi'', which he transl ...

) and Aranzaḫ, the goddess of the

Tigris The Tigris () is the easternmost of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia, the other being the Euphrates. The river flows south from the mountains of the Armenian Highlands through the Syrian and Arabian Deserts, and empties into the ...

river.

Depictions

Tarḫunna was the chief god of the

Hittites The Hittites () were an Anatolian people who played an important role in establishing first a kingdom in Kussara (before 1750 BC), then the Kanesh or Nesha kingdom (c. 1750–1650 BC), and next an empire centered on Hattusa in north-centr ...

and is depicted at the front of a long line of male gods in rock reliefs at the sanctuary of Yazılıkaya. There he is depicted as a bearded man with a pointed cap and a sceptre, standing on the backs of the mountain gods and holding a three-pronged thunderbolt in his hand. Later depictions show him with a battle axe in the form of an adze.

Equivalents

The god had cognates in most other ancient Anatolian languages. In Hattian (a non-Indo-European language), he was called Taru; in Luwian,

Tarḫunz Tarḫunz (stem: ''Tarḫunt-'') was the weather god and chief god of the Luwians, a people of Bronze Age and early Iron Age Anatolia. He is closely associated with the Hittite god Tarḫunna and the Hurrian god Teshub. Name The name of the P ...

(Cuneiform: ''Tarḫu(wa)nt(a)-'', Hieroglyphic: DEUS TONITRUS); in

Palaic Palaic is an extinct Indo-European language, attested in cuneiform tablets in Bronze Age Hattusa, the capital of the Hittites. Palaic, which was apparently spoken mainly in northern Anatolia, is generally considered to be one of four primary sub ...

Zaparwa Ziparwa, originally known as Zaparwa, was the head of the pantheon of the Palaians, inhabitants of a region of northern Anatolia known as Pala in the Bronze Age. It is often assumed that he was a weather god in origin, though he was also associa ...

; in Lycian, Trqqas/Trqqiz; and in Carian, Trquδe (dat.). In the wider Mesopotamian sphere, he was associated with

Hadad Hadad ( uga, ), Haddad, Adad ( Akkadian: 𒀭𒅎 '' DIM'', pronounced as ''Adād''), or Iškur ( Sumerian) was the storm and rain god in the Canaanite and ancient Mesopotamian religions. He was attested in Ebla as "Hadda" in c. 2500 BCE. ...

and Teššup. The Luwian god

worshipped by the

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostl ...

Neo-Hittite The states that are called Syro-Hittite, Neo-Hittite (in older literature), or Luwian-Aramean (in modern scholarly works), were Luwian and Aramean regional polities of the Iron Age, situated in southeastern parts of modern Turkey and northwestern ...

states was closely related to Tarḫunna, Personal names referring to Tarḫunz, like "Trokondas", are attested into Roman times. Tarhunna has also been identified with the later Armenian and Roman god,

Jupiter Dolichenus Jupiter Dolichenus was a Roman god whose mystery cult was widespread in the Roman Empire from the early-2nd to mid-3rd centuries AD. Like several other figures of the mystery cults, Jupiter Dolichenus was one of the so-called 'oriental' gods; tha ...

References

Piotr Taracha: ''Religions of Second Millennium Anatolia.'' Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2009, p. 93 (). Piotr Taracha: ''Religions of Second Millennium Anatolia.'' Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2009, p. 107 (). Piotr Taracha: ''Religions of Second Millennium Anatolia.'' Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2009, pp. 46 f. (). Maciej Popko: ''Völker und Sprachen Altanatoliens''. Wiesbaden 2008, p. 107. Volkert Haas, Heidemarie Koch: ''Religionen des alten Orients: Hethiter und Iran''. Göttingen 2011, p. 228. Volkert Haas, Heidemarie Koch: ''Religionen des alten Orients: Hethiter und Iran''. Göttingen 2011, p. 211 f. Piotr Taracha: ''Religions of Second Millennium Anatolia.'' Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2009, p. 46 (). Piotr Taracha: ''Religions of Second Millennium Anatolia.'' Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2009, p. 52 (). Piotr Taracha: ''Religions of Second Millennium Anatolia.'' Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2009, p. 91 (). Piotr Taracha: ''Religions of Second Millennium Anatolia.'' Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2009, p. 119(). Piotr Taracha: ''Religions of Second Millennium Anatolia.'' Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2009, p. 45 (). Calvert Watkins: "The Golden Bowl: Thoughts on the New Sappho and its Asianic Background." ''Classical Antiquity.'' 26, 2007, S. 321 f. Calvert Watkins: ''How to Kill a Dragon. Aspects of Indo-European Poetics.'' Oxford University Press, New York u. a. 1995, , p. 430
Online
in archive.org). Tyler Jo Smith: "Votive Reliefs from Balboura and Its Environs." ''Anatolian Studies.'' 47, 1997, , pp. 3–49, at p. 36; Philo H. Houwink Ten Cate: ''The Luwian Population Groups of Lycia and Cilicia Aspera during the Hellenistic Period'' (= ''Documenta et Monumenta Orientis Antiqui.'' Volume 10). Brill, Leiden 1961, , pp. 125 ff. (Doctoral thesis 1961, Amsterdam University).

Bibliography

* Gerhard J. Bellinger: ''Knaurs Lexikon der Mythologie. 3100 Stichwörter zu den Mythen aller Völker von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart.'' Droemer Knaur, München 1989, . *

Volkert Haas Volkert may refer to: People * Edward Charles Volkert (1871–1935), American painter * Georg Volkert (1945–2020), German footballer * Stephan Volkert (born 1971), German rower * Volkert Doeksen (born 1963), Dutch money manager * Volkert van der ...

: ''Die hethitische Literatur. Texte, Stilistik, Motive.'' de Gruyter, Berlin. 2006, . * Volkert Haas,

Heidemarie Koch Heidemarie Koch (17 December 1943 – 28 January 2022) was a German Iranologist. Life and career Koch was born in Merseburg, Saxony, Prussia, Germany. She studied mathematics as her major between 1963 and 1966. Subsequently, she worked as a teac ...

: ''Religionen des alten Orients: Hethiter und Iran''. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2011, . * John David Hawkins: "What does the Hittite Storm-God hold?" In: Diederik J. W. Meijer (Ed.): ''Natural Phenomena. Their Meaning, Depiction and Description in the Ancient Near East'' (= ''Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, Afd. Letterkunde. Verhandelingen.'' Volume 152). North-Holland, Amsterdam. 1992, , pp. 53–82. * Einar von Schuler: "Kleinasien: Die Mythologie der Hethiter und Hurriter – Der Hauptwettergott." In: Hans Wilhelm Haussig (Ed.): ''Götter und Mythen im Vorderen Orient'' (= ''Wörterbuch der Mythologie.'' Part 1: ''Die alten Kulturvölker.'' Volume 1). Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1965, pp. 208–212, at p. 209–210. * Piotr Taracha: ''Religions of Second Millennium Anatolia'' (= ''Dresdner Beiträge zur Hethitologie.'' Volume 27). Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2009, . *

Maciej Popko Maciej (Polish pronunciation: ) is a Polish given name, the etymological equivalent of Matthias. Its diminutive forms are Maciek, Maciuś. Namedays according to Polish calendar: 30 January, 24 February, 14 May Maciej may refer to: Arts and ente ...

: ''Völker und Sprachen Altanatoliens''. Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden 2008, . * Calvert Watkins: "The Golden Bowl: Thoughts on the New Sappho and its Asianic Background." ''Classical Antiquity.'' Volume 26, 2007, pp. 305–324.

External links

* Daniel Schwemer
Taru / Tarchun(t)
In Michaela Bauks, Klaus Koenen, Stefan Alkier (Ed.): ''Das wissenschaftliche Bibellexikon im Internet'' (WiBiLex), Stuttgart 2006 ff. June 2006. {{Authority control Hittite deities Sky and weather gods